214 replies to this topic

[squishyx]

Name             GP  G  A  Pts +/-  PIM  Hits BLKS  SOG  TOI
---------------------------------------------------------------
Stephen Gionta   15  1  5  6    0    4   21    5    19   14:12
Ryan Carter      15  2  3  5   -2   11   13    4    20   12:33
Steve Bernier    15  4  0  4   -1   13   16    6    17   12:39

---
Gionta is not "killing this team". Maybe he is a marginal NHL player, but you could probably make that argument about most players who are on the 4th line. Maybe Josefson would be better in his spot, He probably shouldn't be on the PK anymore and have his time trimmed down a bit. But if he is the biggest problem the Devils have right now, then I'd say we are pretty fortunate.

Edited by squishyx, 18 February 2013 - 05:53 AM.

[SterioDesign]

Name             GP  G  A  Pts +/-  PIM  Hits BLKS  SOG  TOI
---------------------------------------------------------------
Stephen Gionta   15  1  5  6    0    4   21    5    19   14:12
Ryan Carter      15  2  3  5   -2   11   13    4    20   12:33
Steve Bernier    15  4  0  4   -1   13   16    6    17   12:39

---
Gionta is not "killing this team". Maybe he is a marginal NHL player, but you could probably make that argument about most players who are on the 4th line. Maybe Josefson would be better in his spot, He probably shouldn't be on the PK anymore and have his time trimmed down a bit. But if he is the biggest problem the Devils have right now, then I'd say we are pretty fortunate.

 

well see. THOSE are numbers that i care about, the guy is able to score, to get assist, he's not in the minus, he's not taking stupid penalties, he's hitting and blocking shots and his stats are really similar to the other 2 guys.

 

ridiculous to sh!t on him and say he's killing the team because of a stupid shot % stats that i still cannot belief people put that much thoughts into. absolutely ridiculous.

 

of course im not saying Gionta is an incredible player or anything but he's certainly doing things right if he's there and i like what he's bringing for what he's costing us.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

well see. THOSE are numbers that i care about, the guy is able to score, to get assist, he's not in the minus, he's not taking stupid penalties, he's hitting and blocking shots and his stats are really similar to the other 2 guys.

 

ridiculous to sh!t on him and say he's killing the team because of a stupid shot % stats that i still cannot belief people put that much thoughts into. absolutely ridiculous.

 

of course im not saying Gionta is an incredible player or anything but he's certainly doing things right if he's there and i like what he's bringing for what he's costing us.

 

But as Tri has pointed out, he's had luck on his side to not be a minus.  The Devils are not likely to keep shooting 13% as a team when Gio's on the ice.  It's similar to when you see a Mike Rupp-type score, say, 5 goals in his first 8 games, and some fans will start talking about "Wow, Rupp might score 20-25 goals at this rate!"  Then you see that he's shooting over 20%.  Is he going to continue that?  Of course not.   

 

Yes, over this small sample, Gio is somehow an even player, and yes, Tri can seemingly obsess about certain numbers, but he's posting some pretty good data about why Gio's currently-respectable numbers will probably not remain that way for long. 

Edited by Colorado Rockies 1976, 18 February 2013 - 09:53 AM.

[DevsMan84]

But as Tri has pointed out, he's had luck on his side to not be a minus.  The Devils are not likely to keep shooting 13% as a team when Gio's on the ice.  It's similar to when you see a Mike Rupp-type score, say, 5 goals in his first 8 games, and some fans will start talking about "Wow, Rupp might score 20-25 goals at this rate!"  Then you see that he's shooting over 20%.  Is he going to continue that?  Of course not.   

 

Yes, over this small sample, Gio is somehow an even player, and yes, Tri can seemingly obsess about certain numbers, but he's posting some pretty good data about why Gio's currently-respectable numbers will probably not remain that way for long. 

 

But the problem is that generally a lot of stats-driven people tend to lump every single piece of data they cannot explain into the "luck" pile.  Often times there are just way too many variables and to just lump it together as "luck" is taking the easy way out of explaining the intangibles that sometimes a player brings.

[Triumph]

Name             GP  G  A  Pts +/-  PIM  Hits BLKS  SOG  TOI
---------------------------------------------------------------
Stephen Gionta   15  1  5  6    0    4   21    5    19   14:12
Ryan Carter      15  2  3  5   -2   11   13    4    20   12:33
Steve Bernier    15  4  0  4   -1   13   16    6    17   12:39

---
Gionta is not "killing this team". Maybe he is a marginal NHL player, but you could probably make that argument about most players who are on the 4th line. Maybe Josefson would be better in his spot, He probably shouldn't be on the PK anymore and have his time trimmed down a bit. But if he is the biggest problem the Devils have right now, then I'd say we are pretty fortunate.

 

76 already made my point for me, but the Devils are shooting 16% when Gionta's on the ice, and they're saving 90.4% of shots - shooting percentage + save percentage is (unfortunately) named PDO, and PDO has a strong tendency to regress to 1000.  Right now, Gionta's an incredibly high 1071, good for 46th in the league among players with 5 or more GP.  And he's still only an even player.  

 

According to a little math, Gionta's been on ice for 44 shots for and 72 shots against 5 on 5, leaving a differential of 28 shots.  Goalies give up a goal 5 on 5 per 12.5 shots, meaning were Gionta to have a PDO of 1000, he should be a -2.  Were he to have a Josefson esque PDO, he'd be -9.  So far so good, but it's really hard to go anywhere in the playoffs when you've got a line getting annihilated - in 2010, the Devils stuck with Rob Niedermayer in a similar role even though he was playing similarly bad.  There are always going to be deeper reasons why you lose in the playoffs other than 'one bad line', but we're returning to the days of the Madden-Pandolfo unit when they were being slaughtered by teams.

Edited by Triumph, 18 February 2013 - 10:07 AM.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

But the problem is that generally a lot of stats-driven people tend to lump every single piece of data they cannot explain into the "luck" pile.  Often times there are just way too many variables and to just lump it together as "luck" is taking the easy way out of explaining the intangibles that sometimes a player brings.

 

No arguments that the sabes-types can really be locked into their numbers and their way of looking at things.  I butt heads with them all of the time.  But admittedly, that 13% number (apparently now up to 16%) is pretty damning.  That means an .840 opposing goalie save%.  That's about as bad as it gets...are opposing goalies going to keep letting pucks in that easily when Gio's on the ice? 

 

44 SF and 72 SA at 5 on 5...in fairness, this is all stuff that points to a guy getting good fortune and bounces going his way. 

[DevsMan84]

No arguments that the sabes-types can really be locked into their numbers and their way of looking at things.  I butt heads with them all of the time.  But admittedly, that 13% number (apparently now up to 16%) is pretty damning.  That means an .840 opposing goalie save%.  That's about as bad as it gets...are opposing goalies going to keep letting pucks in that easily when Gio's on the ice? 

 

44 SF and 72 SA at 5 on 5...in fairness, this is all stuff that points to a guy getting good fortune and bounces going his way. 

 

Maybe not the best example but the first one that came to my mind that is somewhat related.

 

Aleksey Morozov always seemed to score on Marty in every game they played.  Now that might be a little bit of an exaggeration, but both even admitted it seems that way and I remember looking at a stat a long time ago that I cannot find readily now that he did indeed score an unusually high amount of goals against the Devils compared to other teams in the division.  He was also able to do this year in and year out.  Now is this just luck or maybe Morozov just had Marty's and the Devils number?  Honestly I believe the later.

 

Again not the best example but it kinda demonstrates my point.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Maybe not the best example but the first one that came to my mind that is somewhat related.

 

Aleksey Morozov always seemed to score on Marty in every game they played.  Now that might be a little bit of an exaggeration, but both even admitted it seems that way and I remember looking at a stat a long time ago that I cannot find readily now that he did indeed score an unusually high amount of goals against the Devils compared to other teams in the division.  He was also able to do this year in and year out.  Now is this just luck or maybe Morozov just had Marty's and the Devils number?  Honestly I believe the later.

 

Again not the best example but it kinda demonstrates my point.

 

Marty actually mentioned that in his book, that Morozov had a way of scoring on him.  It definitely wasn't at a goal-per-game pace, but it was enough that everyone took notice. 

 

There will always be anomalies in every game like that...the .220 hitter who "owns" a top pitcher and hits over .400 against that particular guy, etc.  Morozov was probably just one of those weird things. 

[DevsMan84]

Marty actually mentioned that in his book, that Morozov had a way of scoring on him.  It definitely wasn't at a goal-per-game pace, but it was enough that everyone took notice. 

 

There will always be anomalies in every game like that...the .220 hitter who "owns" a top pitcher and hits over .400 against that particular guy, etc.  Morozov was probably just one of those weird things. 

 

Oh it was definitely weird but IDK I just drives me crazy when these weird things always get clumped together as "luck" by stats-driven people.

[Marshall]

well see. THOSE are numbers that i care about, the guy is able to score, to get assist, he's not in the minus, he's not taking stupid penalties, he's hitting and blocking shots and his stats are really similar to the other 2 guys.

 

ridiculous to sh!t on him and say he's killing the team because of a stupid shot % stats that i still cannot belief people put that much thoughts into. absolutely ridiculous.

 

of course im not saying Gionta is an incredible player or anything but he's certainly doing things right if he's there and i like what he's bringing for what he's costing us.

 

So I guess we'll just dig up this post of yours when he regresses to the mean and look at this at the end of the season. Because he's lucky as hell right now and it won't last. He'll probably have roughly the same numbers but a bigger minus.

[Devils731]

I always think of the "Lou screwed up letting Voros leave" idea when people want to say shooting percentage is silly compared to the raw goals numbers.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

I always think of the "Lou screwed up letting Voros leave" idea when people want to say shooting percentage is silly compared to the raw goals numbers.

 

That was SatansDevils thing more than anyone else...like I've posted before, he was the one who was the most exciteable when it came to guys like that.  Most people kind of knew Voros wasn't going to amount to a whole lot.  He didn't.   

[Devils731]

That was SatansDevils thing more than anyone else...like I've posted before, he was the one who was the most exciteable when it came to guys like that.  Most people kind of knew Voros wasn't going to amount to a whole lot.  He didn't.   

 

Same sort of gist though, these top line numbers matter, your voodoo numbers are stupid and you obviously don't use your eyes to see a late 20's player has just taken a big leap up in play quality.

[SterioDesign]

But as Tri has pointed out, he's had luck on his side to not be a minus.  The Devils are not likely to keep shooting 13% as a team when Gio's on the ice.  It's similar to when you see a Mike Rupp-type score, say, 5 goals in his first 8 games, and some fans will start talking about "Wow, Rupp might score 20-25 goals at this rate!"  Then you see that he's shooting over 20%.  Is he going to continue that?  Of course not.   

 

Yes, over this small sample, Gio is somehow an even player, and yes, Tri can seemingly obsess about certain numbers, but he's posting some pretty good data about why Gio's currently-respectable numbers will probably not remain that way for long. 

 

Again my point is not that Gio should be on the PK or that he's an incredible player.

 

But whats telling us that his shooting % will remain the same all season long? serious question? there's no possibility of improvement for that poor guy? 

 

I will stand by my point that it's ridiculous to put that much into shooting %. Hockey is not baseball where you can pretty much look at stats and here goes the game. It's like someone pointed out its like Tri is not even watching the game and just go through stats to make a judgement on players. 

Edited by SterioDesign, 18 February 2013 - 11:16 AM.

[SterioDesign]

So I guess we'll just dig up this post of yours when he regresses to the mean and look at this at the end of the season. Because he's lucky as hell right now and it won't last. He'll probably have roughly the same numbers but a bigger minus.

 

he's a $560k fourth line player who played in the AHL most of his career and who PROVED us to be helpful. I repeat PROVED us. And people are ready to sh!t on him simply cause he's lucky based on his shooting % ? Whiiiiiiiiile people are mostly in denial and making excuses and going around stats about our first round pick JJ not being the incredibly smart and elite defensively player some were saying he'd be. 

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Again my point is not that Gio should be on the PK or that he's an incredible player.

 

But whats telling us that his shooting % will remain the same all season long? serious question? there's no possibility of improvement for that poor guy? 

 

I will stand by my point that it's ridiculous to put that much into shooting %. Hockey is not baseball where you can pretty much look at stats and here goes the game. It's like someone pointed out its like Tri is not even watching the game and just go through stats to make a judgement on players. 

 

It's a small sample, but for his career to date, he's 5.9% for the regular season and 12% for the playoffs.  So say he shoots around 8-9% going forward (which is probably being generous, as Gio's future as an NHL regular seems cloudy, and it's not like he's known for beating goalies at any level).  So over 100 shots (and Gio doesn't exactly get much of them on net...only about one per game on average), he's good for what, maybe 8 goals (and I'm thinking 8 is high end)?  But if I'm to guess, I'm thinking 5-8 per season for Gio, IF he plays all 82 games in a typical regular season.    

 

Look, on this one, I do think Tri has made a good case that it could get really ugly for Gio.  And we really shouldn't be surprised by that...he's a 29-year-old who never really figured into the Devils' plans, but got a shot and had a little magic going for a while.  The Devils got more out of him at the NHL level than ANYONE rightly could've expected.  24 playoff games where he was actually pretty good last season?  Amazing.  And like Tri has hinted, probably the very best we'll ever see out of him as a Devil, or an NHLer for that matter.  How many more games will be play as an NHLer, 100, maybe 150 more tops?  He's up to 28 now at the age of 29, and is showing signs of not being able to compete here for that much longer. 

[Pepperkorn]

So the stats are telling us Gio isn't playmaking, but rather just not taking shots?  Or is it that there is no place for playmakers in the new NHL? (just response to singling out one player, not overall point).

 

I'm very supportive of not trusting the wins column as the be all end all in telling a team how they're stacked up heading into the playoffs.  I'm not so sure that I support using a similar philosophy as criteria to re-tool an already decent 4th line.  It's a marker for an option once some other lines get a little more established and rolling consistently for certain.  But to make that move right now seems ill-timed - mostly because it's a shortened season.  Decent isn't going to cut it - I understand that - but jiggering around with things when there are better places to be focusing seems a better use of time.

 

bottom line re this whole thread:

Edited by Pepperkorn, 18 February 2013 - 12:34 PM.

[Triumph]

Again my point is not that Gio should be on the PK or that he's an incredible player.

 

But whats telling us that his shooting % will remain the same all season long? serious question? there's no possibility of improvement for that poor guy? 

 

I will stand by my point that it's ridiculous to put that much into shooting %. Hockey is not baseball where you can pretty much look at stats and here goes the game. It's like someone pointed out its like Tri is not even watching the game and just go through stats to make a judgement on players. 

 

I'm sorry but I can't make sense of this at all.  I think part of it is vocabulary-based though and I don't help because I use a lot of different terms.

 

Shooting percentage is the number of goals divided by the number of shots taken.  A goal on 10 shots is 10%, etc.

 

Shots percentage, something which isn't used by a lot of people, means the % of shots taken by a team while a given player is on the ice (or by a team overall). I think you mean shots percentage when you're saying shooting percentage, or at least that's the only way this makes sense.  Could Gionta improve his current percentage?  Yeah.  Can he get anywhere close to 50%, given that in at least the last 40 games he's around 40%?  Probably not, no.  I don't think he will stay at 37% either, but I don't think he'll get significantly better.  And when you look at shots percentage from last year, for players who played 750 ES minutes, you find one guy even close to where Gionta's at now, and that's Manny Malhotra who the Canucks were using in a purely defensive role, starting a lot in the defensive zone.  Gionta's not starting a lot in the defensive zone.

 

I see how DeBoer draws it up in his head, like a manager who bats a fast guy who has trouble getting on base in the leadoff spot.  You think okay in the 1st inning the leadoff man gets on, then he steals second, 2nd hitter bunts him over to third, and now I've got my sluggers up with a man on 3rd.  Except that that's very rare, and now as a result you're using this fast guy who doesn't hit well more often than any of your other hitters.  DeBoer thinks 'okay, these guys forecheck well, if I get them out against the opponents' top line and they forecheck them to death, I'm way up on them because I've got my top line going up against worse players of theirs'.  Which would be true, except that it doesn't happen often enough.

 

Re:  Morozov - we're asking the wrong question.  We can't know if Morozov's performance (which by the way is 12 goals against the Devils in 30 games, with 50 shots taken) is 'lucky' or not - there's no way of testing that.  The only thing there is a way of testing is whether or not we should expect an Aleksey Morozov in Brodeur's career, given that Brodeur has faced 30,000 shots and X number of shooters, what should the distribution of forwards who've had 40 or more shots against Brodeur look like?  Because there's almost certainly an Anti Morozov out there too who was totally snakebitten against Marty.  Unfortunately I don't know how to do that and it's a lot of work anyway, but you'll never prove anything looking at one case.  We'd have to see if there's a massively unequal distribution of Morozov-ites and anti Morozov-ites, and then see if that holds true for other goalies who've faced 10,000 shots.

Edited by Triumph, 18 February 2013 - 12:32 PM.

[NJDevs4978]

No arguments that the sabes-types can really be locked into their numbers and their way of looking at things. I butt heads with them all of the time. But admittedly, that 13% number (apparently now up to 16%) is pretty damning. That means an .840 opposing goalie save%. That's about as bad as it gets...are opposing goalies going to keep letting pucks in that easily when Gio's on the ice?

44 SF and 72 SA at 5 on 5...in fairness, this is all stuff that points to a guy getting good fortune and bounces going his way.

That line has seven goals this season, two into empty nets. How much does that change the shooting percentage? That's one of the issues with using advanced numbers with a small size sample.

EDIT: Okay, one empty net goal. Even that tweaks the 16% number a little. And the defensive save percentage with them on the ice is not abnormal.

Edited by NJDevs4978, 18 February 2013 - 12:40 PM.

[Pepperkorn]

I see how DeBoer draws it up in his head, like a manager who bats a fast guy who has trouble getting on base in the leadoff spot.  You think okay in the 1st inning the leadoff man gets on, then he steals second, 2nd hitter bunts him over to third, and now I've got my sluggers up with a man on 3rd.  Except that that's very rare, and now as a result you're using this fast guy who doesn't hit well more often than any of your other hitters.  DeBoer thinks 'okay, these guys forecheck well, if I get them out against the opponents' top line and they forecheck them to death, I'm way up on them because I've got my top line going up against worse players of theirs'.  Which would be true, except that it doesn't happen often enough.

 

I don't think hes going to stagnate with this line of thinking though.  I think he sees issues and these guys are place-holding.  I think it's necessary - I'm not happy, but I don't think you're sharing information here DeBoer hasn't seen for himself. 

 

DeBoer has never forced himself into keeping things status quo as past quality coaches for the Devils have.  Lemaire's patient coaching often leaves him holding the bag because his vision hasn't been far reaching enough - he lets himself get stuck on pet issues.  DeBoer is very far seeing and his reach is always pretty deep and wide.  Again - I understand your concern and I think you articulated it very well.  I just think its not as important as it would be were Lemaire or Lou behind the bench.  There is SOOO much going on with DeBoer.  You're an intuitive guy -- it seems to me you may have even come to see this from watching DeBoer's reactions alone then went to the stats.  It's not sitting well with DeBoer, I think you can relax.

 

anyone remember this? http://www.njdevs.co...35311&hl=gionta

Edited by Pepperkorn, 18 February 2013 - 02:01 PM.